Polar bears declared threatened

Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne just declared polar bears as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act, but said repeatedly that the designation would NOT lead to regulations of greenhouse gas emissions — despite the fact that the prime threat to the bear was the loss of sea ice from climate change.

Kempthorne also took the opportunity to make clear that he didn’t think any past, present or future actions by the oil and gas industry posed any problems for the bears. He called for revisions of the Endangered Species Act, which he called “perhaps the least flexible law” ever passed by Congress. He praised the Bush administration for taking action to respond to the causes of climate change. And he lamented that economics and other factors could not be taken into consideration in his decision, that he was limited to looking only at the science regarding the threats to the bears.

Again, global warming and the loss of sea ice are what’s most likely to wipe the bears out, but greenhouse gas emission reductions will not follow from today’s designation.

During a press conference with Kempthorne, Dale Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, was asked by a reporter what additional protections would be given to the polar bears, to which he replied: “That’s a good question.”

He also defended the exclusion of greenhouse gas regulations when protecting the bears:

“We have to have the science to connect the dots between and action (greenhouse gas emissions) and an impact to a species resulting in take (or harm to the bears).”

When might that science show a link between a coal plant chugging out CO2 and melting bear habitat? “That’s a long time away if ever,” Hall said.

“(F)uture reduction of sea ice in the Arctic could result in a loss of two-thirds of the world’s polar bear population within 50 years.”

Also questioned was the data on population trends. Kempthorne stated that the number of bears has risen from about 12,000 in the 1960s to about 25,000 today. When someone asked how solid those figures are, Mark Myers, director of the USGS, said “those early estimates are not as accurate.” He said the current population figures are OK snapshots, though not great for trends, that there are about 20,000-25,000 bears.

Myers said:

“The population data we have is not great, but it’s the best data we have.”

Getting protections for the bears has been a protracted battle that required court intervention to keep the process moving. Environmental groups initially petitioned for listing in February 2005 (see this earlier blog). In December 2006, the Department of Interior said it was proposing listing the bears as “threatened.” A final listing decision was due in January, but was delayed until now.

Here’s more of the science from USGS on why the polar bears are at risk:

“(T)he team documented the direct relationship between the presence of Arctic sea ice and the survival and health of polar bears. Polar bears depend on sea ice as a platform to hunt seals, their primary food. But sea ice is decreasing throughout their Arctic range due to climate change. Models used by the USGS team project a 42 percent loss of optimal polar bear habitat from the Polar Basin during summer, a vital hunting and breeding period, by mid-century.”